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economy-of-small-pleasures

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Economy of Small Pleasures

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Basically, reward and ancipation both use the same system, but differently. Anticipation seems to come in through the senses and get sent throughout the brain, but pleasure seems to come in from more evaluatey bits—maybe to help us learn what’s rewarding.

Anticipation beats reward

Article

A lot of people reckon the brain treats rewards quite differently from the anticipation of rewards. And, in fact, the anticipation of reward seems like the bigger driver of our behaviour. And this little tidbit is one of the few places where human behaviour is actually explained well by exploring the brain. So let’s explore it.
Basically, reward and ancipation both use the same system, but differently. Anticipation seems to come in through the senses and get sent throughout the brain, but pleasure seems to come in from more evaluatey bits—maybe to help us learn what’s rewarding.
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betterment gratification on-(un)happiness on-being-fruitful on-leadership somatic-architecture wealth-architecture

article

The neural reward circuit implies that small, rewarding tasks that share environmental context are going to be the most addictive, so break tasks into small steps that end in a clear good feeling and optimise for a shared environment.

Addictive Work

Article

It’s very trendy to say stuff like ‘start your day by making your bed and something something life is better’. But this is usually some kind of comment about the value of small and simple acts in promoting a sense of order and discipline. I’m not so interested in that. I’m more interested in those small and simple acts that make you addicted to those acts. I like other things that people say are addictive, so this sounds much more my speed, when it comes to productivity.
The neural reward circuit implies that small, rewarding tasks that share environmental context are going to be the most addictive, so break tasks into small steps that end in a clear good feeling and optimise for a shared environment.
Read this article

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betterment gratification on-being-fruitful somatic-architecture wealth-architecture

article

Social media use probably isn’t the problem. Social media use is probably just the most obvious manifestation of lots of problems. And in fact, social media could probably be a solution. It’s up to you.

It's not social media, life is just worse

Article

It has been pretty trendy for the last little while to notice that mental health problems are on the rise, and also social media use is on the rise, and so probably mental health problems are on the rise because social media is an attention sucking monster. But research on the topic doesn’t seem to find any obvious connection between the two. Lots of people are talking about this now, so I will run you through the ‘social media isn’t actually that bad’ thing then give you some other things to stress about instead.
Social media use probably isn’t the problem. Social media use is probably just the most obvious manifestation of lots of problems. And in fact, social media could probably be a solution. It’s up to you.
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digital-architecture gratification on-(un)happiness on-aesthetics on-culture on-thinking-and-reasoning somatic-architecture

article

Active listening isn’t about ticking boxes in conversation; it’s about diving into emotions to transform surface-level chit-chat into deep, collaborative dialogue. Forget models, focus on feelings.

Active listening is misleading

Article

LinkedIn invited me to contribute to a bunch of articles on active listening recently, and while I was thinking about whether I should bother answering, it actually is kind of an interesting topic. My point is not that it isn’t reasonable. My point isn’t even that people should be able to intuit this sort of thing, because although the principles are simple, it’s not always easy to take an empathetic stance during a fundamentally individualistic life. My point is that having a model for active listening almost defeats the purpose of the exercise.
Active listening isn’t about ticking boxes in conversation; it’s about diving into emotions to transform surface-level chit-chat into deep, collaborative dialogue. Forget models, focus on feelings.
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betterment collective-architecture connection on-(un)happiness on-being-fruitful on-leadership somatic-architecture wealth-architecture

article

To close the say-do-gap, we need to feel some ownership of the problem, we need the social support to support the change, and we need to know how. Anything less will make us focus on how good thinking about changing feels and not actually putting in the work.

Solving the say-do-gap

Article

The “say-do-gap” is something management consultants talk about when they want executives to pay for expensive powerpoints on how the executives should do things differently. You see, the executives are saying they want to be better, but they aren’t doing the work needed to get there. It’s a position I bet most of us are familiar with. Fortunately you don’t need to buy an expensive powerpoint to solve this problem for yourself, because you have me.
To close the say-do-gap, we need to feel some ownership of the problem, we need the social support to support the change, and we need to know how. Anything less will make us focus on how good thinking about changing feels and not actually putting in the work.
Read this article

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betterment gratification on-being-fruitful on-leadership somatic-architecture wealth-architecture
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